A Different Kind Of Love
by Miles Heizer
Summary: Drew struggles with feelings that most guys don't have to deal with. He's looking for love. A different kind of love.
1. Chapter 1

:: Chapter 1

I always feel like my bed is so much more comfortable when I'm supposed to get up and get ready. Fine, five more minutes but then I really have to get out or I'll be late for school. I look at my left, and notice the trees gently moving in a rhythm that is controlled by the wind. The sun is shining, and in between a small gap in the curtains, a glimpse of the sunlight enters my room, ending on the floor. I love how when the sun is shining like this, you can see tiny bits of dust flying around in the air endlessly. It's kind of a funny thought that those tiny pieces of dust are always there, but we just don't always see them.

A fresh breeze of air entered my room, and I crawl under my blankets a bit more. I love fresh air in the morning, but it has to be when I'm under a nice warm blanket. As I was just getting more comfortable, I realized that the five extra minutes I gave myself earlier had turned into almost more than ten minutes. _Fuck_. I got up quickly, grabbed some clothes without properly paying attention to what I was actually putting on, and rushed to the bathroom. I quickly brushed my teeth, did my hair and went downstairs.

My parents were already gone. Both of them have to leave early in the morning for work, which for today was probably a good thing because they would never know I was late for school. I left the house without any breakfast, cycling to school as quickly as I could.

I never eat breakfast actually. I mean, I know it's important, but I don't see the point of forcing myself to eat something so early in the morning when I'm not even hungry. My parents often told me to eat something, even if it was just something small. At least I'd have eaten something then, but I just couldn't. Well, I guess I could, but I really don't feel like eating against my will.

As I arrived at school I rushed to the classroom, which, of course, was the wrong one the first two times, as I forgot that we had just gotten a new timetable. The third time I luckily found the correct classroom, and as I entered I smiled at the teacher as kindly as possible, apologizing for the fact that I was late. She didn't really ask any questions. "You are students. We don't need you to be on time. We need you to pass your exams. I don't care how you do it, just _do_ it." I could hear her saying that, because she said it every single time one of our class members did something that represented us not caring about college. Apparently, she did care, because why else would she say it that often?

I looked around me, still gasping for air because I had to cycle to school so fast, when suddenly I caught someone looking at me. A tall guy, about nineteen years old, with a gorgeous face and hair that is so damn perfect that it almost makes you think it's fake. I once fantasized about pulling the fake hair from his head and then the whole class would start laughing because he, too, had hair that never did what he wanted. My fantasies are weird, I know... Where was I... Oh, yeah. Chris. That's his name by the way. Chris has beautiful eyes, even prettier than his hair. All in all, Chris was perfect. A gorgeous, tall guy that every girl would fall for even if she didn't want to. I guess that's because of his awesome hair.

But Chris was staring at me. Why would he stare at me? And yes, he wasn't just looking, he was actually staring. As soon as he saw that I noticed him staring at me, he smiled gently. I automatically smiled back, and then pretended to look out of the window again because I didn't really know how to respond.

Class had reached its end and the teacher told us that we could leave. As everyone had already left - yes, even the teacher was faster with packing her stuff than I was - I finally finished grabbing my stuff as well and headed for the door. As I was about to exit the room, Chris suddenly appeared in front of me. He walked towards me a bit more, which made me walk backwards slowly, and while he did he also closed the door behind him, not losing me out of sight.

"So..." He began, with a voice full of confidence.

"Yeah...?" I replied, rather surprised by him locking us up in a classroom.

"I noticed you've been staring at me in class a lot lately." He said, as he started smirking.

"Me? What about you! You're the one sta..."

I couldnt even finish what I was gonna say, because Chris gently pushed me against the wall, and pressed his lips against mine, supporting his body by putting one hand on the wall, and his other hand on my thy. After a minute or so, I pushed him away from me gently.

"What is this all about Chris?"

"What's wrong. You don't think I'm good looking?"

"That's not it, it's just... I didn't expect you to do this. How do you even know I'm into g-?"

"Don't worry Drew. I've been looking at you, not because you're so handsome, but... Well, you're also really handsome, but... What I'm trying to say here is that I've noticed that you are different."

"Different? What do you mean, different?" I responded, a little confused.

"You're not like the others. You're a guy, but you're sensitive. You're cool, but you're gentle. I know your secret, but don't you worry. I'll take good care of you."

I smiled lightly and gazed into his beautiful eyes.

"Damn... I never knew you were... Like me..." I said to him, placing my hand on his shoulder.

- "Yeah, well. Not everything is what it seems, right?" said Chris, as he smiled at me.

"Right..." I replied, looking at him and smiling happily.

I allowed him to get closer to me again and put both my hands on his hips. He started kissing me again gently, and I kissed him back with slight passion.

This was like a dream... Then suddenly it hit me. I opened my eyes and stared at the ceiling. Damn it. This wasn't like a dream. It _was_ a fucking dream.


	2. Chapter 2

:: Chapter 2

I was a little confused. I had a dream about a guy from my class named Chris, and I'm not going to deny that he is handsome, but I wouldn't want to be his boyfriend... I wouldn't start a relationship with anyone from my class, or even my school, because then they'd know about me... About my orientation. I don't want anyone to know that I... That I like boys.

I'm not the type of guy that wears pink clothes, furry wristbands, girly handbags, or anything else that was originally meant for girls and not for guys. Neither do I like anything on guys that makes him look girly. As a matter of fact, I hate guys that dress like that. I mean, it's their choice... But I don't like that kind of stuff at all. I may like guys, but I dress, behave and talk like a straight guy. Anything that gay guys wear that makes them girly, I hate.

I've felt different since the age of twelve, but I never really knew I was into guys until the age of fourteen. I'm fifteen now. It's still hard for me to accept that I'm into guys, and I still don't feel comfortable using the word 'gay', because that confronts me with who I am so directly that it makes me sad. I don't know why it makes me sad though. Maybe because I'm afraid. Afraid of what people will think of me and afraid of how they will treat me when they know I like guys. I really don't want to get bullied.

Every now and then I dream about someone, a guy of course. This can be about a guy from my class, a guy from a movie or any other guy that I feel attracted to. Those dreams annoy me sometimes and make me angry, because those dreams, too, confront me with who I am. I accept myself more than I used to, but it's still hard. I still struggle from time to time.

When one of those times come where I am really struggling, I totally change emotionally. Sometimes the tiniest things make me angry, along with anything else that annoys me slightly already. I reply disrespectful and annoyed to my parents, when I usually wouldn't. I'm annoyed by things that others do, that I would usually just forget about, but now bug me more than ever.

Other times I literally cry myself to sleep at night. I start imagining things, and as they make me sad, I could burst out in tears out of nowhere, but only when I'm alone of course. And not to mention sad songs, oh gosh, don't even get me started on those... One sad song and my mood could change completely.

I don't show this on the outside, though. I wouldn't want anyone asking me questions because then I'd have to explain things and might accidentally reveal who I actually am. What helps me through the day is the fact that I'm distracted. I've got school to focus on, which makes it easier for me to pretend I'm happy. It's not that I'm sad 24/7 though, I just... I just struggle a lot with my feelings. I'm still trying to get comfortable, but that's really not so easy.

Even though I'm scared of coming out, I do long for a relationship. I think that a relationship with a nice guy could help me accept myself. It would help me become more happy with who I am, even though I am not like most guys. I fantasize about relationships a lot during the day. I think that's why I regularly dream of guys like Chris.

I was still staring at the ceiling. Enough thinking for now. I better get up and not make the same mistake like in my dream, unless I want to really be late for school.

When I got back home after school, I did what I do almost every day. I logged onto my computer and started communicating with people from all over the world. I chat a lot. This can be via games, but it's mostly via online communities, which are meant for people to meet other people from all over the world.

I really like getting in contact with other people, especially my internet friends. I can always count on them when I need to talk to someone, and I don't have to be afraid that they will share my secrets with people that could reveal who I really am, because they don't know any people in real life that live close to me. It's a somewhat safe and secure feeling. There are friends on the internet with whom I can get along really well, and with whom I get along okay, but it's always nice to socialize with either of those two.

I was in the mood to meet some new people, so I started viewing some random member profiles. It's always a matter of time in the beginning, because even though someone might seem interesting to me, that doesn't mean they'll think I'm interesting too.

Some people have such weird profile pictures. Take this guy, whose name is Travis. He has a profile picture of a car in stead of a picture of himself. I was tempted to send him a message...

_"Hey Travis, so uhm... I couldn't help but notice that you have a picture of a car as your profile picture. That's so cool. No seriously. I've always wanted to talk to a transformer!"_

I laughed. I love being sarcastic. Nah, I'll just leave the transfo-... I mean _guy_, alone.

I viewed some more profiles that weren't too interesting, when I suddenly viewed a profile of a guy whose profile picture almost made my jaw drop. It felt as if the whole world had stopped. Nothing mattered anymore, except for the profile picture of this guy. I must've stared at it for at least five minutes. He was so gorgeous... Beautiful brown eyes in which you can drown with great ease, hair that was even nicer than Zac Efron's, and his smile... A smile that made my heart skip a beat. And I hadn't even talked to him yet. He looked quite tall in this picture, something that I really like about guys because I'm not so tall myself. I'd love to cuddle up with a taller guy, being able to rest my head on his chest.

He also dressed really nice. A white long sleeve shirt with a colorful and fashionable print, blue skinny jeans that were just right because they weren't too tight, and red Converse sneakers. Red is quite of an exceptional color when it comes to sneakers if you ask me, but somehow it suited him really well.

I'm not even so sure why, but I felt a really strong urge to send this guy, whose name was Alex by the way, a message. I started thinking and assumed that he probably wasn't into guys anyway, because every single time I like a guy, he turns out to either not be into guys or have a girlfriend.

Yet still, a little voice in my head just kept on telling me to send him a message. Fuck it. What's the worse that could happen? Exactly. So I started typing.

_"Hey..."_

"Seriously Drew? "Hey"?" I thought to myself. "Don't be so childish. You want this guy to think of you as a cool guy, right? Well then, don't be stupid."

_"Heya __Alex!__ ..."_

"Heya"...? "Heya"?! Seriously Drew, what are you, some kind of kung-fu master? Come on. You can do this. Be yourself. Be simple. Less is more. Or whatever that shitty expression was.

_"Hi __Alex__, I'm Drew. How are you? I'm just viewing some profiles to see if there are some interesting people that could be fun to talk to. So I was wondering, do you feel like a chat sometime? I'd really like that, I hope you do too._

_Please let me know._

Drew."

I started to get nervous, and already started to regret the fact that I sent him a message at all. He'd probably have a girlfriend, and that would mean that I had gotten my hopes up and then all that would happen is that I'd get disappointed. I don't even know what I was thinking, I mean...

_"You have 1 new unread message"_

Woah, that was fast. I clicked it and a message popped up.

_"Hi Drew! I'm doing good thank you. I hope you're doing fine too? I would love to chat with you sometime, you seem like fun! Hit me up whenever you see me online and feel like it._

_Alex__."_

I got all excited and logged onto the website's chat modus immediately. Let's see if he's... Yes! He's online! I started talking to him on the chat right away.

_"Hey Alex, it's Drew. Thanks for willing to chat with me."_

_"All good, all good. I was quite bored to be honest. How are you doing?"_

_"I'm doing fine thank you, what about you?"_

_"Yeah me too thanks. Just got back from school so kinda just relaxing in my lousy school outfit."_

_"School outfit you say...? We don't have to wear those where I'm from, luckily! Where do you live?"_

_"I live in Northern Ireland, and yeah unfortunately it is obligatory to wear school outfits here... I hate them but yeah, what can you do."_

_"True haha. Ahwell, I guess there are worse things. So if you don't mind me asking, how old are you?"_

_"I'm sixteen at the moment. You?"_

_"Cool, I'm 15 but I will turn 16 soon."_

_"Nice! Hey Drew I'm sorry but I've got to go now. I'll talk to you again later alright?"_

_"Sure, take care!"_

_"You too!"_

Alex seems like a pretty nice guy. In the end, I'm glad I contacted him. Hopefully I'll talk to him again soon. I replied to some messages from other friends and then I got bored so I turned off my computer and watched some tv.

I was really excited somehow. It's weird how someone who you haven't even met in real life can make you feel that you have actually met that person, just by chatting with him or her. Before I had shut down my computer, I had taken another look at his profile picture. I just couldn't believe how attractive he was. Maybe he wasn't the best looking guy in the planet, but he had something that drove me crazy, in a good way. I think I like him...

Another few days passed until I got to chat with Alex again. I was just doing what I do every single day, when he invited me for a chat. As we started talking again, I noticed how Alex and I had this great kind of 'click'. We had the same interests when it came to music, we both liked the same food and movies, and we had tons of other things in common. There was just one thing that I didn't know about him yet, and that I was dying to ask him, but I didn't have the guts to ask. Until suddenly...

_"So Drew, how is your love life? Any girlfriends?" _asked Alex in a new chat window.

_"Well, to be honest... And this is kind of hard for me to say but, ... I'm not really into girls. I'm... gay."_

_"Oh, nice. Me too."_

_W-wait... What?_ _He was into guys too?!_ My heart started beating faster and I got all excited... But soon enough I realized that even though he was gay, which was what I had hoped for all this time, a relationship or anything between him and me was probably never going to happen. I mean... We live thirteen hundred miles apart. Not so realistic, is it now?

Even though I was quite active on the chat community where I had met Alex, I was on MSN way more often, so I decided to ask him for his e-mail address so that I could add him there. Since the day that I had added him there, we were chatting with each other every single day. We got to know each other even better, and I was enjoying chatting with him more than I had ever enjoyed talking to anyone else. Then one day, he asked me a question that I had thought about asking him myself in the beginning, but never did and was probably never going to because it seemed too unrealistic to me...

As we were having another chat, we were dying from laughter because we had found a hilarious video on the YouTube, and we kept making each other laugh over and over again with new comments.

_"... And the look on her face... Oh my god I'm laughing so hard!"_

_"I know right! Haha! Drew, you're so damn hilarious when it comes to things like this!"_

_"Speak for yourself lol. You really know how to make someone laugh!"_

_"Ahwell... I guess that's just because we have a lot in common, don't we Drew?"_

_"Yeah I guess we do Alex."_

_"So uhm... On a serious note, there's something that I've been willing to ask you for a few days now, Drew."_

I didn't expect Alex to get so serious all of a sudden, because he normally wasn't like that at all. But I felt something coming...

_"Sure Alex, what's up?"_

Alex started typing, and even after what seemed like an eternity, but what was probably just a few minutes, my MSN window still read "_Alex is typing..._". I guess that meant that he was trying to find the right words to say what he wanted to say, and that what he was going to say, wasn't just something. A few moments later, he had obviously finished typing as the following message popped up on my screen:

_"Well, Drew... We've been chatting for a few weeks now and I know this might sound weird, but I've really started to get feelings for you. I hope that this won't scare you off, but I love the way you always make me laugh, even when I'm sad. You always know what to say and you just make me so damn happy. I'm so grateful I've met you, and I really want to get closer to you so therefore I want to ask you... Do you want to be my boyfriend...?"_

It took me a while to actually realize what Alex was asking me. He was asking me to be his boyfriend! I'd love that! But, wait a minute... There's one _tiny_problem. We live over a thousand miles apart. I started typing a response, hoping I could find the right words and not hurt his feelings...

_"First of all, thank you for being so honest about your feelings Alex. That is something I really appreciate. I can't say that I don't have any feelings for you, as a matter of fact, I know I do and I think you're absolutely gorgeous, both from the inside and from the outside... But I have to be realistic: we live so far apart that it is kind of hard for us to get together in real life. I would love to be your boyfriend if you lived near me, but I can't really see this happening between us. I'm really sorry, I wish things were different, but I don't think I can be your boyfriend online and not be able to be with you in real life at the same time."_

Hoping I hadn't hurt his feelings, I read his reply...

_"Okay, Drew... I understand... It's such a shame though. I really have feelings for you and I would be ever so happy for you to be my boyfriend. You're just... So damn perfect. I'm hoping you don't mind me asking if you could think about it for some time? I know it's hard for us to be together in real life, but we can talk via MSN like we do every day, right? Some couples live close and don't even get to talk to each other every single day. And, eventually, we could be able to meet... But that's something for the future. Please think about it, I really, really, really like you..."_

Woah. I never knew a guy would ever be into me like this, especially not a hot guy like Alex. The thing was, though, that he lived too far away. I told him I'd think about it, but I had actually already made a decision. As much as I'd love for Alex to be my boyfriend, this was too unrealistic. _Damn it._ For the first time I've actually met a guy who I absolutely adore, yet he happens to live hundreds of miles away from me...


	3. Chapter 3

:: Chapter 3

I couldn't get Alex out of my head. I kept making up reasons why an internet relationship with him could work. But I had to be realistic. What I really wanted was a relationship, a real one. One where I get to wrap my arms around my boyfriend. One where I could cheer my boyfriend up by talking to him in person, stroking his cheek and telling him that everything wil be okay. Those things just aren't possible over the internet. I can cheer him up, sure, but I can't see him so I wouldn't know if he'd really been cheered up or not.

Even though it had some disadvantages, I slowly started realizing that an internet relationship, too, could turn out to be something beautiful. I've seen tons of couples on TV that are ever so happy, and if they are being asked where they have met, they name the internet...

Maybe I should just give it a chance? I mean I really like Alex. I could give it a try and just see how it goes, and if it doesn't go well I could just end it? What have I got too lose. Yes, that's what I'm going to do. I like Alex, Alex likes me. Love is love, even though it's a different.

I was kind of nervous, planning on telling Alex that I had made the decision to give it a go. I was waiting for him to come online. I knew that he had finished school about fifteen minutes ago, and that fifteen minutes was approximately the time it took him to walk home, so he could come online any moment.

Every extra second it took Alex to log on, I got more confident and certain about my decision. We could have so much fun and be so happy. We could see each other on the webcam when times get hard - which was also quite exciting, because we had never done that before. The only way in which I knew how Alex looked were the several pictures that he had shown me. He is so cute...

"Alex has logged onto MSN Messenger."

I immediately double clicked his name in my contact list and greeted him.

"Hey Alex!"

"Hey Drew. Miss me much?" said Alex, which was meant in a sarcastic way.

"Oh yeah, I was about to walk to Ireland because I couldn't stand the few hours I haven't talked to you..." I replied, playing along with the sarcastic game that we often played.

"Haha! Oh Drew, stop it. So how are you doing?"

"Haha. I'm doing great thank you, kind of..."

"Is something bothering you Drew, are you okay...?"

"Yeah, no... I mean. Yes, I'm okay. I just... I've thought about what you had asked me a few days ago."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, about you asking me to be your online boyfriend."

"Mhm, so...? Have you made a decision yet?"

"I have, actually. I decided to... Be your boyfriend :)"

"What?! Really?! OMG! This makes me so happy Drew! Thank you! :D"

"I'm glad it does! It makes me kind of happy as well!"

"Good! Phew. I've been thinking about you a lot and I just didn't want you to feel any pressure, but I kept on hoping that you'd say yes... And now you have. I'm so happy Drew!"

"Haha good. Yeah, I thought to myself, what have I got to lose you know? You're such a gorgeous guy so, yeah. I'm proud to be able to be your boyfriend!"

"Awesome Drew. This is great! So... When are we gonna get married?"

"Haha don't push it you!"

"Hehe just kidding don't worry.. No seriously, how about tomorrow?"

"Haha shut up!"

We had a lot of fun as boyfriends already, and this only the beginning of a relationship that would totally change my life.


End file.
